I actually escaped the office a week or so ago and helped with some field work!  I got to smell fishy again! Mostly I just want to show you some pictures of the fish we were sampling, flathead catfish at Branched Oak Reservoir.  However, I realize there might be some who read this and want more information, so let me recommend a previous blog if you want to know why we were doing this sampling:  Branched Oak Flatheads. Once again …

Gonna start this blog with a news release, like I often do, but then there is more to the story. . . . Major fish die-off investigated at Olive Creek Lake August 17, 2018 LINCOLN, Neb. – Low oxygen levels have caused a major die-off of fish at Olive Creek Lake, according to the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission. The remaining fish population is suspected to be small. The die-off was reported by the public and investigated by Game and …

Gonna take a break from my usual Friday blog material. . . . Yes, I am all about fishing, almost all the time.  I am also all about Nebraska, all the time.  I’m born and bred Nebraskan, my blood runs red, it is home, I love it. Someday I am going to write a blog about the Nebraska sandhills.  I have not done it yet because I am afraid I cannot capture my thoughts in words.  There have been a …

I got outta the office this week to help stock some fish.  Stocking fish is nothing unusual, we will stock over 30 million fish in over 250 Nebraska waterbodies again this year, and once in a while I lend a hand. The species of fish I helped stock was nothing unusual either, channel catfish.  We will stock over 200 thousand channel catfish in over 160 different Nebraska waterbodies just this year.  No, what made this unusual was the size of …

We live in a land that has been greatly altered by man.  You can see that in most every habitat in the state.  Many of our rivers and streams have been very much altered.  In fact, I would bet that if you could jump in a time machine and travel back a couple of hundred years, you would not even recognize some Nebraska rivers and streams. Naturally, a pointy-headed fisheries biologist could recite a long list of changes that have …

I was surfin’ around the interwebs about a year ago and saw a headline that caught my eye: Thunder Bay lawyer says FOI request for fishing spot is without merit I will not copy and paste the story, but if you want to read it all you can HERE. What it said was there was a guy that paddled into some provincial park up in Canada and did a story on the big brook trout he caught there.  After seeing …

I have often said that a person can catch any fish that swims on a jig.  Now that is not a brilliant comment by any means because jigs come in an infinite variety of shapes, sizes, styles, colors, bodies, etc.  They are a very versatile fishing tool and can be used for a variety of species in a variety of fishing situations.  You should have pounds of them riding in your tackle box. The fact that they are so versatile …

Just about a month ago I blogged about suspect zebra mussel larvae being found at Cunningham Reservoir in north Omaha, Meanwhile on the Invasive Species Front. . . .  At that time I held out hope that the larvae that had been sampled was some other species of mussels.  Nope, the news has gone from bad to worse, Adult zebra mussels confirmed in Cunningham Lake August 3, 2018 LINCOLN, Neb. – The presence of adult zebra mussels in Omaha’s Cunningham Lake …

Found this on the interwebs recently, like I blogged a couple weeks ago, I suspect many of you have “been there, done that”. This time I can tell you where that video originated, Informative Fisherman. Anyway, I have always said that everyone needs a good net man, and the net man should know exactly where the net is, at all times! Reminded me of this classic Rapala commercial: Before you make a cast, get it out, have it accessible, both …

I started to write this blog a few weeks ago, actually did not start writing, I simply copy and pasted a really cool video I found posted on FaceBook: https://www.facebook.com/bob.lusk.7/videos/1933984829965711/ When I watched the first part of the video, I appreciated the cool footage of a mayfly nymph that is common in our waters, likely a burrowing mayfly of the genus Hexagenia.  The video is cool because you can see the gill filaments and the undulating swimming motion of that …